Sisters
by Demoira
Summary: Through ‘Tabula Rasa’ Buffy POV, Dawn POV: That night, after Tara leaving and Giles leaving, Buffy comes home. And only Dawn is there.


The house is so quiet. The walls echo with the hollow feeling as I enter. The shadows play against the dim streetlights and not even the curtains move.  
  
Tara is gone. Willow is over at Xander's, not quite ready to face the empty bed.  
  
Dawn should be asleep.  
  
I am alone now, in this house where my mother died, with my sister, for whom I died. There's no where left to go, and no one left to hide behind.  
  
In the end, it always has to be this way: Dawn and I.  
  
She brought me back from the brink, and I think I hated her for it, that night on top the tower. And now she's forced me through the pain to her. Again. I think I hate her for it.  
  
I go upstairs.  
  
*  
  
My heart pounds as I pretend to sleep. The night shadows are still around my room, but my entire body is pulsing with the need to jump out of bed.  
  
Buffy's home. I wait for her to check on me, open the door a crack and silently gaze at my bed for a moment before going to sleep. She never wakes me. But I'm never asleep.  
  
I wonder what she is thinking when she sees me. She never really talks to me, not in any way that says . . . how she feels. I don't know what to say anymore.  
  
She died for me. She came back from Heaven for me. She was going to go to Hell for me. But she won't talk to me.  
  
I squeeze my eyes shut, the tears forcing their way free.  
  
*  
  
Tonight, I can't look. Her face, so peaceful in rest, always reminded me of the feeling of being . . . wherever I was. Before. And there is always that moment, when I look at her, that it feels as if, maybe, being back is a good thing.  
  
I think, in that moment, I feel again.  
  
But tonight, if I feel that moment, I won't have anything to distract me. Like tiptoeing quietly past Willow's and Tara's room so that I won't wake them.  
  
Tonight, I leave Dawn's door closed. Tonight, I walk calmly past the open door to their room, my Mom's room, and through the door to mine.  
  
I close the door behind.  
  
*  
  
I hear her pass by. It's a century of silence while I wait for her to come back. Then I know, for the first time since she's been back, she doesn't want to stop to look at me.  
  
I can't help but think that this means that she no longer wants me. That, maybe, I'm not enough to make this world okay for her anymore.  
  
Remembering the feeling of knowing, even when I didn't know who I was, that she was my sister and that she would take care of me, I can't let her just walk away.  
  
I can't let her drift through the house like a ghost. I need her, and I'm selfish enough to make her be here for me. If only she would be so selfish.  
  
*  
  
I'm surprised to hear the door open. Dawn doesn't much drift through the house anymore. I think she got used to having a couple living under the same roof as her. But there she is, white-cheeked, here eyes dark with the night.  
  
She doesn't look quite as alive as normal. And that eases the pain a little. All the life flowing from her, the vibrancy, it hurts me sometimes. It's like looking straight at the sun – you know it will hurt, but you can't quite stop yourself.  
  
I can feel the life everywhere: in the ground and the wind. Sometimes a breeze can feel as if it pulling away at my skin. But, while I can feel it all on the outside, the inside stays hard and unyielding. There isn't a sensation that drifts past the surface.  
  
Still, occassionally, when Dawn is near, her blood calls out to me with the recognition of blood shared. The draw is so strong . . . stronger than I can be. She keeps me here, just as she could send me away.  
  
And I'm not ready yet to move. I just need to lay here – alone – for a while to recognize that no one is going to come to my rescue. But then, there's Dawn.  
  
*  
  
Her head hardly turns to see me. I don't even think she recognizes who I am. I'm beginning to think that she and I are strangers.  
  
Her eyes are sad. They've been sad since her return. I keep wondering, now that I know where she came back from, if it wouldn't have been better had I let her go the second time.  
  
But, the words she said to me, when before she jumped off that tower: now I have to take care of her as well. She's part of it all.  
  
I risk her unseeing eyes, her stillness, maybe her rejection, and crawl onto the bed beside her, wrapping my arms around her.  
  
*  
  
The shock of her warm flesh, proving once more how very alive Dawn is, jolts something inside of me.  
  
I think I wanted to hate her. It was so much easier to hate this child beside me than to acknowledge how much I loved her fresh sweet scent and the whisper of her through rooms. The connection draws us close even after an eternity away from her.  
  
The love hurts too much. A thousand needles through my lungs, it hurts too much.  
  
I want to unleash some fury on her, drown her in pain and hatred, be disgusted or at least indifferent to the touch of her soft flesh to mine. But I can't. Her small hands have drawn all the fight out of me.  
  
I ease into her embrace. My lungs are on fire, it hurts too much.  
  
*  
  
The sudden weakness in Buffy's body frightens me. Before, even when she was resting, there was tension in her body. She was always ready to fight. Before. But now, it's all gone, here, as I hold onto her. It's as if she is giving up. No longer fighting.  
  
But I have to be strong for her, and to do that I can't let her know how her relaxed body terrifies me. I want to pull away. Instead, I hold on tighter, grabbing on fast and curling my head into her breast.  
  
I'm not letting go. I'm not letting go.  
  
The words flow through me head, repeating themselves as slowly, everything inside me calms.  
  
I'm not letting go. I'm not letting go. I'm not letting go.  
  
She needs me. And whether she wants me to or not, I'm not letting go.  
  
*  
  
After a while, the room was completely still. Not even the blues of the night shifted. I think maybe she is asleep, but she isn't.  
  
Lifting her head from my shoulder, she looks me in the eye, and asks quietly, "Was Mom there? In Heaven?"  
  
Something inside me melts away. The hardness that has held me dissolves.  
  
And that's when I finally cry. 


End file.
